“I wouldn’t buy somebody’s album on a dare if they called him a musician’s musician. I don’t write to be a writer’s writer. I don’t want to be like the little-magazine writer.”

I thought I was writing for a fairly hip, intelligent crowd; I just thought there were more of them out there. But they’re not. They’re not out there waiting. They’re not gonna use their intelligence on your book.

I don’t really care about plot; I want to have a page-turner in a different kind of way.

I found out about reviews early on. They’re mostly written by sad men on bad afternoons. That’s probably why I’m less angry than some writers, who are so narcissistic they consider every line of every review, even a thoughtful one, as major treason.

The alcohol had the code and mystery about it as a writer’s drug, but I’m glad that’s been debunked. But the trouble with the drinking, much as I hate to admit it, is it helped the work.

I was always kind of florid. And full of rhetoric. That was my flaw. My whole time writing, I’ve had to work against that because it can be a wrecking posture.

Professional Southerners sicken me.

Children will listen to anything elders say to survive, and if you grew up without an elder telling you there was a god, what did your parents say to you?

My best stories come out of nowhere, with no concern for form at all.

I lost my second marriage because of drinking, and I loved the woman very much. But I thought I needed booze to write. I’m glad I was disabused.

Randomness I love. And I still love just a holler right in the middle of an ongoing narrative. Pain or joy, ecstasy.

I wake my wife up at 3 a.m. and say, “Listen to this!”

Voice comes to you through a spell, a trance. The best voices are not you… they’re a little away from you.

I wanted very much to be Miles Davis when I was a boy, but without the practice. It just looked like an endless road.

If you are able to explain suffering, a man once told him, you weren’t really there.

Most novels I come across have all the excitement of a long trip on a bus with a sensitive glee club. Yammer and chat.

The wild stuff is all so overrated. Drinking, you don’t feel good all the time. There’s a lot of down, a lot of misery.

People don’t make albums any more. It’s always about singles. I wanted to take that old-school approach.

Cry Baby wasn’t necessarily a baby theme but I understand what they’re saying. So like, Cry Baby is definitely a remaining character throughout all of my albums.

I’m obsessed with the venue and the people so it’s going to be really fun.The last couple of tours I didn’t have anything like that because of the budget, so I’m super excited because this is really going to bring the album to life.

So like what I want to do is connect all of my albums and make it tell a bigger kind of story. So the first album is very focused on her family life and her love life.

So like what I want to do is connect all of my albums and make it tell a bigger kind of story. So the first album is very focused on her family life and her love life.

So like what I want to do is connect all of my albums and make it tell a bigger kind of story. So the first album is very focused on her family life and her love life.

A concert is not a live rendition of our album. It’s a theatrical event.

An album is a project with which you have to hit hard.